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While the fluffy headline promises a revelation about Google, this article is actually a poignant lament on the future of work automation. The piece's author h
by aresant 9y ago
While the fluffy headline promises a revelation about Google, this article is actually a poignant lament on the future of work automation.
The piece's author holds a humanities degree in Psych/Neuroscience.
I point that out because while we've accepted that blue collar jobs are/were "going to be automated" or "going overseas", there's still a pervasive trope that an undergraduate degree provides some protection and is of value unto itself in the workforce.
But - as evidenced by his systematic experience of key-pressing - his position @ Google is a stop gap, in the same way that the humans in Uber's vehicles are a tolerated inconvenience.
This while the people the company ACTUALLY values, at present, are the engineers - tasked with devising new ways to automate, regulate, and systematically eliminate human fallibility from the equation.
Solving the problem of what to do with the millions of us that take steps to educate ourselves, want to contribute, but realize that we're a poor facsimile of the machine that will eventually eliminate our jobs, is the central question of our generation.
- typetypetype 9y agoWell said!
- dcow 9y agoAnd yet people seem more interested in bickering about politics than addressing the root of the problem.
- cc81 9y agoWhat is the root of the problem?
- bmomb 9y agoA fair distribution of resources and opportunities. I believe that if we do not address this problems soon enough we will be (soon) living in a cyberpunk dystopia.
- AckSyn 9y ago> A fair distribution of resources and opportunities. This is one of those idealist dreamer type mindsets and bears no basis in reality. I can't for the life of me understand how anyone could believe in it having been educated in basic economics and politics.
- fixermark 9y agoHow would one decide what a fair distribution of resources and opportunities looks like, if not via bickering about politics?
- logfromblammo 9y agoA Pareto distribution with alpha >= 2 (and likely alpha < 5, because that's starting to look too much like Communism) and x_m >= the cost of basic necessities for one person--including shelter, water, food, sanitation, medical care, education, and their share of upkeep for the transportation and communications networks. No one suffers from lack of vital resources. Yet it is still possible to get rich via a combination of luck, skill, and tenacity. Seems fair to me. Of course, this leads to bickering about how to calculate the numbers, so....
- fixermark 9y agoAt the point where you said "and likely alpha < 5, because that's starting to look too much like Communism", we're back on politics. This is a blind-spot I see in a lot of technically-minded folks: politics as an evil to be avoided via technological solutions, as opposed to politics as the natural side-effect of needing two or more people to come to consensus on combined action. You can definitely improve the space of possible solutions if you have technology at your disposal, but you can't remove the human from the equation if you're solving human problems.
- logfromblammo 9y agoSo merely saying "Communism" is sufficient to make it political? In terms of fairness, my opinion is that alpha less than 2 puts too much wealth in the hands of the rich, hurting the baseline quality of life, and alpha greater than 5 probably doesn't concentrate enough capital to support innovation, competition, moonshots, and luxuries. I was defining an objectively measurable middle ground between two economic antipodes that have each had extensive political backing now or in the past. This contrasts with those who decry any movement in the direction of redistribution to be greasing the slippery slope to Abhorrently Evil Communism, and any movement in the direction of concentration to be greasing the slippery slope to Abhorrently Evil Capitalism. When you define numeric values, it becomes harder to hijack the discussion by throwing around loaded words and charged phrases.
- dcow 9y agoJobs that once existed no longer exist because they've either been automated or outsourced.
- Matumio 9y agoBut the lack of jobs is not a problem, assuming the same amount of things can be produced. A problem would be not having access to those things.
- s_kilk 9y agoThe class relation
- n-gauge 9y agoIs that class overloaded?
- scott_s 9y agoPolitics is how peaceful societies address problems.
- mo3s 9y agoI think this guy sounds like an over-entitled sheltered snowflake. If you have the sense to get into Google, then it follows you have the sense to go and get a job anywhere else on the planet. Who cares if Google didn't work out? There is no dearth of interesting work going on in the world today. Go find it. That said everytime I watch Sunder Pichai doing his pseudo Steve Jobs routine I get a headache at how superficial and unimaginative Google is. I am not at all surprised at the shallow culture.
- bllguo 9y agoDon't know about "poignant" - this reads like "I chose the wrong career and it's Google's fault" - but 100% yes, this is one of the biggest societal issues we face. The author may have realized a bit late that he doesn't enjoy HR, but he still deserves a chance to pivot. That's getting harder in our economic system and with automation and outsourcing.
- briandear 9y agoI remember looking at Hacker News in 1895 and remember the fear of automation was just as noteworthy then. Weird how increasing automation over the past 200 years has led to record low poverty and a higher standard sign living that would have unimaginable.
- bllguo 9y agoOnce we resolve the issue of people being automated out of their careers then of course automation will be a net positive on society. You don't have to tell me - I work in machine learning and data. These are basically growing pains that require a societal paradigm shift.
- Pyxl101 9y agoNot just HR - the lowest rung of recruiting. It sounds like the author was doing cold-call sourcing.